The LENARD F-4G

8 years in the making!

UPDATED OCT. 14, 2021

ARRIVAL DAY !!!

after one year and 6 months the Proto-type has arrived !!!

For those that regularly have kept up to date 

you know this Blog was written like a log with 

small changes & updates. It was confusing for new 

readers so I did a total rewrite so it is totally fluid 

and easy to read. It also contains new history

that lead to final design changes.

I LOVE MY GIBSON
So if like me you love your Gibson you certainly are not alone. Every time there is some kind of poll for the best electric guitar on the planet ...it is the Gibson Les Paul that wins!!!

BUT
It is the Stratocaster that is number one in actual purchases. Note I did not say Fender. Yes one has to count them all. The copies and 'ME TOO's'... Right?
So if like me you occasionally hear a sound that turns your head but is not a Gibson sound nine times out of ten it is a Fender Strat or a Tele.
Yes secretly sometimes we think a Strat or a Tele would be cool to own. It would even be a better choice for a few tunes we already do.

So we go down to the local music shop and try one.
Before we even hear that first note we are about to play ...we are put totally off by the neck! 
It is eight miles long and feels about as comfortable as a broom handle laying 
across our palm.
We then squeeze a few note out of the thing and notice the tone is as about as fat as a banjo. LOL

ANOTHER BIG BUT
So we overdrive the sound. Get a bit of crunch on the thing. If we have a Strat around our neck we soon find that the bridge pickup sounds like a hummie on an hundred dollar beginners guitar. It is thin nasal and harsh just simply crap. Where is that lovely Hendrix chime?? Surprise ...we soon find the best sounding solo tone is in the neck pickup. The mid pickup is not too bad either. So now you know why even Fender offer a hummie for the bridge position.
First impression? Forget it!!!

Next we bring over a Tele. Now the spank on that bridge PU with a bit of gain is more like it!!! We then try the neck PU. "JUNK!"

CONCLUSION
The tone of the mid and neck PU in a Strat is really quite nice. The sound of the Tele bridge would be a lot of fun for some serious shredding. The Tele neck pickup and the Strat bridge pickup is a waste of the planets resources.

Then there is the neck that should have been use to make a broom handle!!!  LOL
My god the F__king price for this ...crap. There out of their mind!!!

So you leave the store disappointed.

BUT YOU ARE STILL THINKING ABOUT IT
So the days, weeks, months etc. go by.
Maybe you are at a club and you hear a hot player with a Fender and you think.
"Maybe I was a bit hasty about that time I checked  those guitars?"

Actually you were!
Actually you certainly were NOT!!!!  LOL

WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS IS ...
A Fender style guitar with a Tele bridge pickup and a mid and neck Strat PU.
First that  long scale neck has got to go! 
Give me a decent neck on the thing.  
Hey ...while your at it!!!  Get rid of that piece of crap whammy!!!
You better do something with the damn body shape too. 

I don't want anyone seeing me with a Tele or Strat around my neck!

HEY!  The price is NUTS!!! 
OK I need a Pro guitar but this is a second guitar for me...PRICE?
lets get reasonable!!!

A GIBSOCASTER?
OK ...I'm like you. I love my Gibson's My SG Standard Ltd. Ed in Classic Sunburst and my  '59 reissue Les Paul Special in TV yellow! Sure I modded the LP bridge PU. Sacrilegious I know! But I put a 59 PAF at the bridge. This guitar is hard to hold onto when I shred. It tends to set itself on fire. LOL

Speaking of on fire ...

...yes there is no Santa or Easter Bunny ...but there is a Billy Gibbons and he gave me

something  small enough I could take home in my pocket and it aint no a hand wound easter egg!

Forgiven??
...Thanks.

So been there got the T shirt and all that crap.
So why doesn't someone make a guitar like that???

I'll tell you because the guys making the guitars out there have their heads into what they offer you.
They truly think it's better so you 'should' love it!
Secondly the guys that think about it seriously are guitar players first. Even if like me they have made a very exhausted study of finding out what makes a great guitar GREAT... they are frightened to be 'THAT' guy who sticks his financial nuts in the fire.

BIG BUT! It appears fate has chosen me! LOL

I have had not only come up with the idea for this guitar but I took 8 years and hundreds of hours learning how to design every aspect of a solid body electric guitar. I also learnt industrial design from the best. Industrial design is all about the best way to design for simplicity and consistency in construction and assembly so you get a great product with as few steps as possible without compromising the guitar.
The hardest part is the PRICE!!!

It is all about labour costs, shipping and having as few hands as possible in the chain from the assembly line to your front door.
The only way to get it done is to find a Chinese manufacture who can give you at least Fender's 50's quality of build and on reasonable terms. There are indeed guitars that can be bought wholesale in China for less than $25.00 USD. Yet there are guitars made by high makers like Eastwood that have for decades only made high end violins used by players in the world's leading orchestras that cost $3000.00 USD + just to make a single violin. These same guys make the Eastwood guitars. Bottom line? 

It can be done!

_____________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________
THE LENARD F-4G
LENARD Re-inventions Est. 1976
___________________________________________

WHY ???
What will it look like ???  Why?
What will it be made of ???  Why?
What kind of hardware will it have ??? Why?
What kind of electronics will it have ??? Why?
What kind of finish will it have ??? Why?
What will it cost ??? Why?

If you made this guitar I would not be here writing this.
I would however be reading your Blog.
I would want credible answers to my questions as why I should buy your guitar.

WHAT WILL IT BE MADE OF
It's a Fender... the body has to be Alder or Ash and grade 'A' just like Fender.

WHAT WILL IT LOOK LIKE
OK... the guitar will not be taken seriously if it is just another Strat or Tele wannabe...it has to have it's own shape. No one really wants a clone. If you have a clone you are always defending it. Always saying it is just as good as or some other blah, blah, blah. But it needs a Fender vibe!

WHAT IF?

1950

1954

1957

1952/2020

LEO DESIGNED THIS GUITAR

The Tele arrived in 1950

The Strat arrived in 1954
If there had been a guitar made in 52 there is evidence it could have looked like the F-4G.

Half Tele half Strat and and a few ideas only on Leo's rough sketches in '51.

Sketches of a Tele with a bass horn very similar to the near complete but not yet released first Precision Bass and on that same sketch the treble horn is simply removed. Finally a large pickguard with all the pots jack and PU's attached to it

In the 50's a Strat is a huge departure in looks from the Tele. In as early as 1952 it might of failed to capture a buyers imagination ...so I wanted something that seemed like a guitar Leo Fender would actually risk making. 

After all most of the serious players back then were still playing big hollow body Gibsons or a New York made D'Angelico.

No one even made a semi so you could ease your way in. There were just these two extremes.

Thanks to Trevor Wilkinson who spent a couple of years with Leo himself
I found out there were rough sketches of a guitar in '52 that was a Tele but with an 

upper horn on it borrowed from the idea for the '52 P. Bass that Leo was working on.

Leo was constantly designing so a great deal of every Fender design over the years

had already been roughly sketched out to be return to for future guitars as early as 1951.

In 1952 Kay designed the Kay Vanguard. It was an entry level guitar and the biggest selling electric guitar in the world for years. Notice the lower bout cutaway. So using this idea is definitely in keeping with guitar shapes of pre '55 guitars. The Lenard has nothing anachronistic about its design to say it could not have been made in  1952  This was always my goal.

The pic of the rear of the Kay clearly shows a shape very similar to what

Fender used on the 1957 Jazzmaster. It could have been sketch by Leo years before. Even back in '51.

The point is once I seen this pic I new this basic shape would work. I also know 

thousands of Kay's sold with this shape which is also reassuring.

Complaints about the back of the Tele cutting into the players body were common

hence a 'tummy cut' in the rear. Dings on the edges and some discomfort on

the players lower arm instituted the rounding of the body's edges though a 

forearm contour was not yet considered.

It would be a hybrid. A transitional guitar.
It would have the Tele PU in the bridge. Yes the PU that makes a Tele a Tele!!!
Finally the 2 Strat PU's mid & neck.
The PU's that make a Strat sound like a Strat with all that chime.

WHY THE NAME?

The guitar has had several names but sooner or later a legitimate claim came out of nowhere and I was presented with the horror of a ...

'Cease and Desist'. 
Solution?  There is a history in my family going back light years including myself and my father of males being tagged with the name LENARD which is a rare Old English spelling of Leonard. So with nothing ...least of all guitars being named LENARD being found on my exhaustive research I simply screamed out "Victory!" and claimed it!

The first electric guitars arrived in the late mid 1930's. The decorative style was ART DECO at the time. So the decorative features and the logo on the guitars were Deco. In time Deco fell out of fashion. BUT not so with electric guitars both Gibson, Gretsch. Rickenbacker and many others still use it. I see no reason to change that either. So I choose the Poiret Art Deco font for the logo.

Why ?

Art Deco Poiret lettering/font for writing
LENARD on the headstock ;-)

F-4G 
                   A FENDER -4FOR A GIBSON GUY

The WOOD

Hardtail Strat
our pickguard will mimic it
one volume one tone & the 3rd
pot will be the output jack goes.

Tonewoods do affect the sound but those that were first chosen for the first few electric guitars ever made were not chosen for their sound that's a myth!!! There is a grading system for wood that goes from Paint Grade A to Grade A to AAAA and was created long before solid woods were used to make a guitar.
Even Paint grade A wood is a solid piece of wood without any cracks or splits or knots or any structural problems. Discolored pieces are 'paint grade' furniture wood because the grain and uneven coloring of the wood is not uniform enough for stains and clear finishes.
Yes ...it is graded for furniture where AAA will have some burl or be flamed. It's all about the decorative factor when making furniture. So it is sold in smaller lots for very big coin.
The early guitars used woods as a decorative factor too. It was only by dumb luck that the woods chosen sounded good. But once discovered they soon exploited their properties but in a trial and error way.
In 59 the Les Paul Standard's total number was 150 guitars.
Gibson bought Grade A wood in enormous bulk in short they bought the whole damn tree! By doing so a few of the trees had SOME AAA wood in them.
Only a few of the 59's had this great looking wood most just came with a normal straight grain top.
WHICH SOUNDS THE BEST ???
It's all luck ...the grades are meaningless for tone. The very best sounding one out of all 150 could have been  the ugliest. 

THE FINISH

Well since 'ugly wood' has equal tone to beautiful wood it is the way to go but it will need a paint job.

The cheapest paint is oddly enough the shiniest and most robust. We will use what is on the Fender Custom color charts. They use DuPont Duco Polyester and have since 1956. The only downside is it doesn't look great on a clear coat or a sunburst body. So opaque finishes often referred to as solid colors are the way to go. Purest will claim nitrocellulose lacquer is the only finish for great tone ...yet a 50's painted Tele or Strat is to die for. It easily sells for thousands. lol

Many people bad mouth poly finishes for killing tone. Tell that to the guy with a '62 Strat! Scientifically it can affect the tone with a very, very small damping factor but I have played a few Gibsons that use a lacquer with strident highs that only sound good with tone rolled back.

You may have this guitar forever. We do not want 'this years hot new colors' because in a couple of years they will look dated whereas vintage colors are ALWAYS considered cool.

 Also keep in mind the most expensive Les Paul you can buy that is NOT a Custom shop model is the ...
LP Custom ....$4,699.00 USA  ....finish? ....BLACK POLY PAINT!!!!

So we get a great finish! Best of all there is no down side.

The colors will be classic Fender Black, Olympic White, Fiesta Red & Surf Green.






This guitar is made to last a lifetime ...you may trade in your current Gibson for a better one but the Lenard is a keeper so we want our colors to weather time ...both physically and cosmetically and most definitely tone. The Alder will improve with age.





Gibson uses nitrocellulose lacquer on there high end guitars. It is claimed it breathes and give the guitar a better sound. It fades and can easily check but many players find all this both better and like the patina of a distressed finish.
I may have a choice for the same price.
So I will wait to choose until I know.


Last but not least. I am a trained Interior Design and Decorator.
I was an honour student. Straight A's ...the top of my class. 
I know how to make anything look good in fact look startlingly good.
Yes an egomaniac boast. BUT A FACT!!!


The neck wood could be maple with a Rosewood fretboard. BUT... first as most of you know because of international agreements on crossing borders. Rosewood is under the Endangered Species Act. So ...It will be all Maple. I can not afford to ship guitars confiscated at the world's borders.

Nothing is more Fender then all Maple. Leo Fender's Tele only came in all maple. In fact even the Strat was not offered with a rosewood neck until 1959.

The Tele was a first!!! 'Real' guitar players in 1950 thought it was a joke. But they also owned big bodied Jazz guitars and they had Ebony fretboards. They thought Rosewood was garbage too.
Ebony is expensive the only reason rosewood got put on the classic Gibson's is at that time it was a cheaper wood and easy to work with. NO SH_T!

The neck will be Gibson LP  like with a 24 3/4 inch scale a medium C profile  12" radius and medium Jumbo frets.
Frets that are leveled, crowned, dressed, and polished!

Note the Gibson L6  which had a bolt on neck. The neck minus the Gibson headstock will in effect be our basic template. Old Gibson necks were cut and sculpted by hand and a few were gems.

Ted MacCarty nailed which ones so we will have one of those.
In short 100% Gibson neck shape made of Fender's choice ...Canadian Hardrock Maple !!!
It will be bolted on just like every classic Fender is.
The headstock will look Fenderish without infringing on TRADEMARK laws.
Reverend put this headstock on their Eastsider T. It is as narrow as the Tele but looks like a Strat.
They stole the Fender idea but stayed just inside of the law not infringing on the Fender headstock that is a registered trademark. Thank you Reverend. LOL

Finally and most important. The time spent by Fender and others on detailing the neck with attention to final adjustment setups and fret work on rough or protruding frets or frets that may only be just slightly too high to give you a low action are measured in minutes.Yes
When the time is up ...you get what you get good or bad!
The standard for Lenard is quite simply to get all this right no matter how long it takes.
This will be the single biggest expense when you buy a Lenard. I want the guitar as playable as the very best money can buy right out of the box!!!

NUT.... Bone ...standard USA Fender spec.

STRING TREE ...classic  single 'T' style 

                                                             
BRIDGE
 A good bridge gives you good sustain. If the bridge is made by using a mass of metal it will increase the sustain BUT it kills
your tone because the the tone is coming from the bridge not
the wood.
Sustain can be best obtained by putting downward pressure of strings into the wood. By going over the saddle and then straight down thru the wood will do this.
The bridge that does this is a 1954 hardtail Fender.
When you pluck the strings or bend a note or do trills you can move the saddles on ALL new Fender bridges. BUT this design is such that the saddles act like springs creating tension pushing on the string and the screws threads dig in stabilizing the saddle forcing it to stay in place thus allowing the vibrations into the wood.

Leo Fender's last new 
design & it still uses 
bent steel saddles.

Players removed the bridge cover on early Fenders that went over this bridge to allow for palm muting so the bridge indeed can stab into your hand making it a 'bit' uncomfortable.

Fender later went for solid smooth saddles.
'BUT' they can move thus killing sustain.
The Fender bent steel bridge is also the cheapest pro bridge you can buy which keeps the price down.

NOTE - these new bent steel saddles were the last ones that 

Leo Fender designed himself. They were meant to be easier on your hand
but note the actual part the string goes over wasn't changed.

Leo designed when he was at G&L.
Now you know why. Yes all those expensive modern bridges are bull.
They do not improve the sustain. They kill it!
The original saddles aren't broke so we won't fix them!

NECK PLATE

Nothing clever here just a part of every Fender.

In this case the 50's one without 'F' stamped on it.

TUNERS
Kluson style tuners ...cheap and simple. A simple
brass gear does all the work.
Better tuners like Grover Locking 16 to 1 ratio and
machined steel are easier to tune with BUT they
do not KEEP it in tune better.
The Klusons do not slip very easily.
Also keep in mind every day someone is dishing out
thousands to get a new reissue Vintage Fender Vintage 

Tele or Strat. These are the tuners they come with.

1983 US STRAT ? Yes ...Surprised? ...I was.
Check out the output jack placement
Note one volume & one tone too.
I borrowed this idea.

KNOBS & SWITCH CAP

A white pickguard & knobs.

Having tried them all I find the Tele barrel switch cap
the easiest and most comfortable to use.
It is also period correct.

PICKGUARD
It will have to be custom made but it basically will be very Strat like
With a hole for volume then tone then the output jack.



THE ELECTRONICS
Basically the same spec as all Fenders. The pots are Alpha.

According to Dave Friedman pots that cost up to 5 times more by famous names and made in the U.S. are now are made from imported parts and do not last longer. WTF!
As for the controls ...a 5 way blade switch is a given.You can not put 3 vol & 3 tone knobs on it ...so where do you draw the line?
Simple...one tone one volume!
The PU's are made by either Artec or Cor-Tec. Both are Korean companies that make PU's for PU designers for Custom Shop and luthiers world wide. They also make all the Asian made PU's on guitars that use American brand PU's like Seymour Duncan. Yes there are Korean Seymour Duncan PU's.
Many of the new 2020 Epi's have Korean Duncans on their better guitars.
I personally got a chance to compare the build and sound of some Duncan PAF's. Just do not store both in the same box or you will never figure out which is which. lol
So many guys will never upgrade because the 'sound' and quality
is 100% pro!

A FINAL WORD

As you have seen every detail of the design has been researched, weighed and considered.

What you can not see is the elements of the design that also make it realist to build on a budget.

Doing this saves time and money and more important eliminates difficulties that often produce errors

and/or sloppy looking work.

HOW MUCH !  
Well I will be straight up. I do not know. 
It all gets down to how many orders I have in the early days. These are in effect custom made by a luthier. It ain't no assembly line sh@t made by someone that doesn't even play a guitar. Every time a task is formed on a guitar like setting up a router or a jig etc. it takes a lot of time just doing a single guitar ...do even 3 guitars at the same time saves hours and can drop the price. 

At present one guitar will be $895.00 USD.
At this price they are made one at a time so I can hardly complain.
It is all about time. For example ...a painter preps the paint and the booth etc. to paint just one guitar. Then he spends a half hour cleaning his gun etc. It is not rocket science to see that if he paints perhaps 6 it will not add a lot to the time. The work in all areas of a shop have a lot of costs with prep and cleanup. 
I really hope to get it down to one or two hundred cheaper.

Keep in mind in 1950 the Tele was $169.00 USD but guys were getting 75 cents an hour!
The average family made $3300.00 USD a year. A guitar was a luxury item.

A prototype is a template to keep a constant uniformity in both the quality look and cost of the guitar.
I have no idea of how fast these will sell so they will be made one at a time. Bonus for early buyers as 10S has a large inventory of the finest woods etc. They only keep a basic amount of less pricey woods. These are fine tonewoods but the woodgrains are not killer ornate. BUT it is cheaper to use what's on hand as it would for example cost more to order a single grade A alder body blank then use a triple A hand select that was part of a discounted large order sitting right there on the shelf!

REMEMBER THE DAMN THING WILL BE HANDMADE NOT SHOT THROUGH AN ASSEMBLY LINE AT FULL SPEED!!! 
The difference between a Lenard and a Fender Custom Shop Vintage Tele in fit finish and hardware is negligible. For a comparison a painted '53 Fender Custom Shop Tele is going for $6,399.00 USD. Five times the price!!!
Even when we can get some production numbers up ...the guitars are still being made in small groups by hand. Think Gibson's '50s manufacturing methods.
At the very least expect a guitar with the quality of a those 50's Fenders.

The prototype will be in Fiesta Red
Fender borrowed it from this 56 Ford Thunderbird
It was the first custom color that Fender offered.

Ideal ...as a second guitar you get the best or both Strat and Tele and you don't even have to choose,
You get a Gibson neck shape so you are ready to rock with the guitar right out of the box.
You get 'real' tonewood that only sounds better over time. That makes investing in any upgrades that you prefer to hot rod your guitar in the future not a waste of your money. The hardware and PU's it comes with may be modest ...but the equivalent can be found on Fender Custom Shop guitars

SO YOU THINK THE GUITAR SHOULD COME WITH MORE MODERN FEATURES ?

WHERE DO I STOP???
If every guy gets one or two modern features
it will soon start to look like this.

IF IT AIN'T BROKE DON'T FIX IT !!!
Many of the best players in the world
play a 50's or Custom Shop Fender 50's 
and would go nuclear if a single thing was updated!!!

WHO WILL MAKE THE ...LENARD F-4G
So this video showed up on Rob Chapman's site. It has nothing to do with the F-4G but as Rob Chapman is obviously blown away by the fit, finish, playability and sound of 10s guitars I thought you would like a hint of how good a job that it's maker 10s can make a guitar. Rob not only is a great player but has his own brand of guitars.
I feel this speaks a lot to the quality that 10s is capable of.
It is 10s that I choose to make the prototype.
If it passes the tests ...10s will be my partner in LENARD guitars.
They will have their name on the back of the headstock.
I have paid extra for an even higher standard than the guitar in the video for any Lenard guitars

10s made a guitar for DARRELL BRAUN 

He was so blown away he too is going to 

get them to make some Darrell Braun Guitars

that he will sell.

It will be good value for money. BUT not cheap!

THE BUILD

NOV 2019 
The body was cut just before the Factory was lock down for the C19 virus 

MAY 2020
Shop re-opened 7 months later. Guitar painted and is curing. 

SEPT 2020
I feel they are still playing 'Catch Up' as I am still waiting. If nothing else if I just get the guitar and it is even 
less than perfect I will have a prototype to present to other makers. I have no way of knowing that they may have other contracts to supply other brands with guitars and are between a rock and a hard place. Every promise they make I have sent a return letter telling them to put quality before speed. I need to know I can get what is possible under average conditions.

NOV 2020

Finished!

APR 2021

Still not here!!!!  WTF ...don't ask!!!! The short story is the factory is in a heavy C19 lockdown zone.

Cargo finding its way to a local international air freight airport had is contents locked up in an a joining warehouse and was not shipped until March 27,2021. Had the guitar been trucked to a different location a few days later like other guitars were this would not have happened. It is simply dumb luck! Even more ironic the airport and it's warehouse are a short walk from the factory. In fact if only one guitar was shipped on particular day you could carry it by hand to ship it.

FINISHED PROTOTYPE

I am lost for words! it certainly looks very close to what I imagined. There are always minor things that may need a change things once I have played it. No I have not played it because it has just been shipped from China and with C19 it will move at a snail's pace. 

I am concerned about the balance and feel. It is enough Strat like that it should be excellent. I spent a long time on paper getting the balance to be killer so it feels glued to your body but WTF playing is believing. There are many problems with designs of guitars out there that are caused by bad design. Many makers design for looks over function because players buy with their eyes then regret it later. I am fairly confident about the sound being indeed be pre '54 Fender.

What is not obvious are the many small things that allow it to even be massed produced one day. I am sure for a few years everyone will be handmade. But it is  design even by hand to save time. This keeps a handmade guitar under $1000 instead of over $2500 !!!

Basically it is a guitar Fender designed in 1952 to actually replace the Tele. Fender felt in '52 his guitars should be like cars. When the new model came out the old one was discontinued! No sh@t. It was not released so by 1954 and the design slowly morphed into the Strat. In some ways it surprises me. Leo was big on simple easy to make designs and a whammy or the Strat output jack would be both needless and controversial.

Even know more than half of all Strat players do not use the whammy and there wasn't any vibe coming back from customers and dealers that they wanted one. Many of the early sales were the Strats that came with the 'hard tail' bridge. The Tele still sold a lot more than the Strat when it came out. It was not until Buddy Holly used one in 1957 did start to sell enough to stop perhaps being discontinued or replaced.

Of course he certainly would not put a Gibson spec neck on it like I did.

Best pic
no fisheye effect from the
phone's camera lens.

A friend of mine who is a Strat guy read this. He said if it was a Fender guitar that actually did come out in '52 Leo would have named it the Forecaster. LOL 

DELIVERED PROTOTYPE MAY 4, 2021

...A long time from wacking out the big bucks on Oct 13, 2019!

A long trip with a lot of stop over delays and a lot of temperature changes with zero time for the wood to acclimatize. Even so the neck is dead straight and the action is

low. Every signal thing I asked for was done well and done right. I have not done an inch by inch look but the fit and finish appear excellent. The frets are set and finish well. There is no fret sprout. The guitar sounds very impressive. The Strat PU's are killer. Really nice and chimey. The Tele PU has a nice spank though my ears are tuned into my '55 Duncan's. I am just not accustom to it. Actually the one on the Lenard has a lot more sustain. A hell of a lot more! 

It just occurred to me ...in fact I walked over and played the guitar not plugged in. All the killer sustain is coming mostly from the wood. The body has amazingly excellent resonance!!! Bonus plus! The guy making it cherry picked this piece! That's what you get when a luthier not a worker makes your guitar :-)

All PU's balance really well together. The neck took about a half hour to get a feel for. It is a chunky LP medium C like on a '59. Not a 60's or an SG. I had the same neck in the mid 60's on a LP Special. I always felt it was the best neck I ever had. With thinner necks your thump has further to reach the neck which can stress it when you are flat picking or finger picking which can cause fatigue. once that happens you end up pushing down harder and it can even cause pain. I have a Ibanez type thin neck on one of my guitars, nice for shredding but forget flat picking.

Last but very important the tummy cut is perfect.I do not feel the need to lean over like on my SG. Add to that the balance is dead on. No neck dive. The guitar just sits where I want it and does not move with both hands off.

Tomorrow I hope to give it an inch by inch check out. New pictures for sure. I hope it is sunny. Overcast is as good because the light is OK and there are no shadows.

I will play it a few days before I change the strings and fine tune any adjustments.

MAY 24,2021

I sent a repeat E to 10s with my issues with the guitar. The main one is the bridge. I wanted a vintage Fender hardtail bridge but got a combination top loader and through body bridge. The other issue is some 1/4 jacks on high end cords will not fit in the output jack. I use a wireless and that jack fits fine so it it is not a personal issue.

I also asked about getting the guitars made in quantity and wished to know about setting up similar arrangement that Darrel Braun has set up to sell his guitar.

I am waiting on a reply.

My objective was to make these guitars very affordable.This is becoming very difficult

to do and keep an acceptable and consistent quality.

Alternatively my other alternative is to have them made by a luthier in Canada. The guitar would be superb but the price would be heading into the $1200.00 USD or more category.

JUNE 2,2021

I resent the message as I did get a reply. I have waited several days. I am going to have to assume that they do not want my business. I can speculate many reasons but

not answering me with even short and polite 'have a nice day' reply speaks volumes.

There is not a second choice. I did follow up some good leads but they too were ignored.

I do have a different avenue. I know of several excellent Canadian builders that sell their own guitars at prices of around $1200.00 to $1500.00 USD. I would get American Custom Shop quality for an excellent price.

I will follow up on this just to see if there is a feasible way of getting the guitars at under $1000.00 USD

JUNE 22,2021

Oh my... as I can easily tell from the video's above ...Darrell Braun has pulled his 10s

video from his site. WTF I wonder why ???    :-)

Wow.. this blew my mind! I found an old video showing a few seconds of an 8mm home movie camera of a Fender employee playing a prototype Strat. at the Fender shop on his lunch break. 

Yes it is valid to say it is virtually a 57 JazzMaster

but it shows how many ideas Fender had between 1951 and 1953.

I never saw this when I designed the Lenard. I was working from verbal descriptions.

and adding the best probability to connect the dots.

1953 Fender Strat Prototype

JULY 15, 2021

I have today found out about a luthier who literally makes a guitar that is 80% Tele but seriously updated. Even the bridge is his design. All the materials are high end. He is all about giving you a minimum of a Fender USA guitar quality build but uses all high end materials.

A Lenard F-4G in a high end harshell/gig bag delivered to your door worldwide will be a simple $1050.00 USD.

Nothing is negotiated yet. The guitar, case and delivery incl. at $1050.00 USD will NOT be more. It may be less.

OCT 14, 2021

There Electric guitar is made of parts. Those making the guitar do not make all the parts. Decades ago American made guitars made of American parts. When Gibson needed a volume and tone control pot they ordered it from an American Company that made them. That company bought the parts they made them from other companies that specialized in making the small bits and pieces that went into those pots. Now those pot companies are still around but the parts to make that pot come from China. In short the world has ground to a halt because there is an endless chain of companies that make things and others that transport them out of action.

I talked to an appliance wholesale who can get daily updates on probable delivery times. Yesterday he got one ordered with the delivery projected to 2031, WTF.

To say my guitar is on hold is an understatement.

JAN 10, 2022

Not surprising at this moment a further big Covid lockdown has seriously interrupted even any commitment from a new builder I just discovered  I have played my Lenard every day now for months. Note it sitting beside my SG. I expected good things but not exceptional tone but I am getting just that. Killer chime from the Strat PU's. The bigger surprise is the Tele PU is total terror when played thru an OD.

More to come :-)